Thing 36 Smash a Mirror

Oh dear... Now I've done it. It's funny how a little superstition goes a long way. We'd have serious questions to ask about anyone who waves at random animals, but nobody bats an eye-lid at someone saluting a magpie. People, of all shapes, races, genders and creeds will walk around a ladder rather than under it. Which is amazing considering that we're all appallingly lazy, apparently not lazy enough to endure some bad luck. Saw a dude washing the top of BT's on O'Connell Street in Limerick, he was on top of his ladder, and there was a queue of very fancy looking elderly ladies inside the door, refusing to come out, for fear of the underside of a ladder. Initially I thought they were checking out the dude on the ladder, and I thought, fair play ladies, you've all still got it, but it was actually the ladder they were looking at...

And it's not just nice old ladies who suffer from superstition. The manliest of manly men do too. Builders, in their vests and hard boots, with diggers and and hands like shovels, diverted the Ennis Bypass around a fairy tree, because nobody messes with fairies... Honest.

We're also afraid of: Friday the 13th, black cats, stepping on cracks, opening umbrellas inside the house, birds flying into your house and albatrosses.

And of course... breaking mirrors....

Pictured: Seven years of bad luck wearing a ridiculous attempt at eye-protection.

I guess superstition makes fools of us all. I won't bet against Munster in rugby, even when I think we might lose, because I think it's bad luck. I've been known to throw salt over my shoulder from time to time, to erase previous bad luck... Yep. That's right. Perfectly good salt. Ruined. Even today, when I was buying the mirror, I was being ridiculously careful not to drop it. Which is stupid. I was only planning on breaking it anyway... It's also possible to erase your bad luck by turning clockwise seven times.

But I'm not doing that. I'm starting the fight against superstition here...

P.S. If anything bad happens me, tell my family that I love them... Oh, and come visit me in hospital: Bring four-leaf clovers, horseshoes and rabbits feet...